Learning to Trust
by DarkDreamer56
Summary: DV He'd seen the damage he’d caused with his outburst, and he knew Vala well enough to know that she’d do everything she could to pretend that what he’d said hadn’t hurt her.


Title: Learning to Trust  
Author: DarkDreamer56  
Archive: If you want it, ask please!  
Rating: T  
Pairings: D/V  
Disclaimer: I don't own them, but if I did, oh the possibilities…  
Spoilers: Big time spoilers for Unending (10x20)

A/N: This is the first non CSI fic I've written in years, but something about the relationship between Daniel and Vala has inspired me to delve into the realm of Stargate. I'm a recent Stargate convert, but I could see the chemistry between these two in syndicated runs of "Avalon, Part II," and then "Momento Mori" sealed the 'ship for me.

* * *

Daniel hadn't quite expected his night to end up this way, but he certainly wasn't going to complain. Especially if it meant that he had the experience of a warm, naked Vala lying half on top of him, her cheek resting against his chest. As she slept, her long dark hair spilled out in waves around them.

Daniel's fingers couldn't stay still, alternating between stroking lightly up and down her spine and tracing random patterns across the small of her back. Vala stirred slightly, her fingers curling lightly against the side of his torso where they rested. Daniel felt her body press up against his a bit closer for a moment before she relaxed back into a deep sleep.

Vala had fallen asleep after they finally collapsed into a sweaty heap against Daniel's pillows. Neither of them had been left with the energy for words, so Daniel had just pulled her to his side and pressed a kiss to her hair. Vala squirmed a little to find a comfortable position, but after awhile her breathing evened out, signaling that she had fallen asleep. Daniel was hoping to follow suit, but hours later, he was still watching her sleep as his mind raced with thoughts that even Vala on top of him couldn't derail.

He couldn't help but smile as she sighed softly in her sleep; this was a rare glimpse into a completely different side of Vala. Never in a million years had he imagined it to be quite like this.

_Never in a million, a million million years…_

_Well, then you should say what you mean._

_I don't think you want me to start doing that._

This time it was Daniel who sighed, furrowing his brow and pulling her even closer. He'd tried to block it out, but Daniel knew what they were going to have to talk about when Vala awoke. First thing he was going to have to do was apologize. Sure, some of the things he'd said to her in his angry rant had a grain of truth to them, some were things that had been true at one time, and many of them were things that he'd spent the last two years convincing himself were true so that he didn't have to face his real feelings for the ever confusing space pirate currently draped across him. But he still shouldn't have gone off on her the way that he had.

Daniel hadn't realized how worked up he was until he had found himself actually laughing. _I can't even imagine what a relationship with you would be like_. Now that was one of the blatant lies. Of course he'd imagined what a relationship with her could be like, and that was what had scared the hell out of him. In most of the scenarios he had come up with, Daniel ended up brokenhearted once Vala decided to move on, and he wasn't sure that he could survive that kind of heartbreak again.

So after three months of being stranded in the time dilation field on the Odyssey, three months of making almost no headway in the Asgard database, and two years of trying to deal with the mystery that was Vala Mal Doran, Daniel snapped the second her fingers reached for his belt buckle. At first he was surprised that Vala had let him keep going without throwing in some of her own heated observations about him, but the more he ranted, the more worked up he got. When he'd finally finished, he'd crossed the room and leaned against the desk, crossing his arms and turning away while he waited for Vala's own verbal attack to begin. What he hadn't expected was the silence, followed by her sniffling. He remembered muttering something about her pretending to be hurt, but when he finally turned around to look at her for the first time, he could see that either she was a better actress than even he would give her credit for, or he had actually struck a nerve. A big, exposed, raw nerve. And that sight of Vala burying her head in her hands when she started to cry, knowing that he had caused it, was going to haunt Daniel for a very long time.

Still, Daniel couldn't deny that Vala had certainly not made it easy for him to see that he was anything more to her than a friend and sometimes means of combating boredom. Sure, Daniel knew that he was important to her, her first real friend and ally on Earth, and the guy that Landry appointed to keep on eye on her. Even with all he had been through with Vala in the beginning, Daniel knew that Vala genuinely wanted to make a contribution to the SGC and their attack on the Ori. She was important to him too, and he had reasons that had nothing to do with Adria or the Ori for wanting Vala to stay on with the SGC. But Vala was so good at hiding behind her vixen façade, that Daniel found himself hopelessly lost when it came to figuring out whether Vala was messing with him out of boredom and because she knew how to press his buttons, or if she was hiding behind sexual innuendos and flirty gestures because she was afraid of facing her actual feelings. And most of the time, she frustrated him far too much for him to give her the benefit of the doubt.

Of course, when she'd finally let him see her face earlier, he'd realized exactly which reason was behind most of her games. He'd also seen the damage he'd caused with his outburst, and he knew Vala well enough to know that she'd do everything she could to pretend that what he'd said hadn't hurt her. If she even acknowledged anything that had been said before he kissed her, she'd blow it off with a comment about Daniel thinking he must be pretty important for anything he said to leave a mark. So he'd have to be the first to bring it up, and probably dodge a few of her defense mechanisms to get her to talk about it, but after discovering the feeling of having her asleep in his bed and in his arms, he was willing to put in the work to make sure that it was a practice he got to know quite well.

"Mmphmm."

Daniel's thoughts were interrupted by Vala shifting against him; he could feel her nose tickling his chest before she lifted her head. Even without his glasses, Daniel could tell that she was still half asleep as she propped her chin up on his shoulder. He resumed idly running his hand up and down her spine as she got comfortable.

"Time's it?" she asked sleepily.

"Early."

There was silence for a few moments while Vala was waking up. He was grateful for the time to try and figure out how to bring up the subject he knew she was dreading, but she momentarily derailed his train of thought when she finally spoke again.

"I should probably get back to my room…Mitchell and Muscles would be quite devastated if they saw me exiting your quarters in such disarray…" Vala trailed off, and Daniel winced at the hesitation in her voice, the hesitation that he had placed there. The words were Vala's, but the tone was someone less vibrant, less sure of herself, and Daniel knew then that they really had to talk about what happened.

His hand pressed into the small of her back reassuringly. "Or you could stay for awhile." He was amazed by the smile that answer had earned him, unable to resist grinning back, and then took advantage of her close proximity to capture her lips, partially to soften the blow of what was coming, and partially because it was something he'd wanted to do since she'd fallen asleep.

Daniel let himself revel in the sensation of his lips on hers for several moments, before reluctantly pulling away, and whispering in her ear. "We need to talk about what happened last night…"

He felt her recoil as the words were out of his mouth, and he reached for his glasses so that he could better ready himself for this battle. Experience had taught Daniel it was better for him to have use of all of his senses when it came to dealing with Vala in difficult situations.

"And hear I thought that you were trying to initiate round three, darling. Don't you think that might be a better use of our time?" Her tone was light as she awkwardly recovered, and leaned closer again to let her index finger trace a line between his pectorals, but the anxious look in her eyes did not match the bright smile she had plastered across her face, not that Daniel hadn't expected her to deflect the conversation with some kind of innuendo.

"We need to talk first."

Vala sighed and pushed herself up, bracing herself on his chest and perhaps digging her nails in a little more than she really needed to. She sat up against the pillows, drawing her knees to her chest and the sheet up to cover herself. Vala's unusual display of modesty was probably for the best; Daniel wasn't sure how focused he would remain on their talk if her breasts were on display. "Daniel, there's really no reason…"

Daniel was already sitting up beside her and reached over to take one of her hands. "Yeah, Vala, there is. If…this…is going to work between us, we're going to have to be honest with each other. We're going to have to trust each other. Both of us."

He wanted to make sure that Vala knew Daniel realized his own part in their tumultuous relationship, but Vala still seemed stuck at the first part of Daniel's statement. "Daniel, I think you were _honest_ enough for the both of us last night. In fact, I don't know why you even want me to stay." She tried to extricate her hand from Daniel's grasp, but he held on firmly. She'd gone from denial to defense more quickly than he'd expected, and he wanted to make sure she didn't flee to her own quarters before they dealt with this.

"No, I want you to stay. I'm sorry…I didn't mean a lot of what I said the way that I said it."

Vala's head whipped towards Daniel, clearly not exactly sure what he was trying to say. It didn't take her long to recover, however. "No Daniel, if that's how you feel…"

"Felt. It's how I felt. But I don't feel that way anymore." He wanted to add, _or we would have never ended up in bed_, but he figured at this point in the conversation that comment would earn him a slap.

Daniel looked over at Vala, trying to read her expression. Her eyes refused to meet his, and though her hand was lying rather limply in his grasp, she hadn't yanked it back yet, giving Daniel hope that they might just make it through this conversation with their as yet undefined relationship intact.

"Then why? If you don't feel that way anymore, and you didn't mean it, then why did you say those things? What were they?" She looked down, examining her free hand. "That I'm an _emotional, unstable wreck? _I'm not trustworthy_ on a personal level?_ And my personal favorite, that I'm simply _having a laugh at your expense?_ Paraphrased of course, I was a little distraught at the time, so my memory might be a bit faulty. All the same, I think I got the basic point." She finally yanked her hand back, trying to keep her voice even, but Daniel hadn't missed the slight tremor.

Daniel winced as she threw his own words back at him, pretty accurately at that. The last time he had heard that tone in her voice had been just after they'd brought her back to Stargate Command when Ba'al had thwarted their plan to capture Adria and Vala had been convinced that SG-1 had betrayed her. No, she wasn't going to make this easy for Daniel at all. Not that he had expected or deserved easy.

"I was frustrated Vala, and I took it out on you." Daniel sighed, pushing his falling glasses back up the bridge of his nose before continuing. "You reached for my belt, and I just snapped. I know part of it is a defense mechanism for you, but I thought that we were finally past that." Vala was staring at her knees stoically while Daniel took a deep breath. "I'm sorry that I thought you were messing with me, but you're so good at hiding what you're feeling, even if I think I know what's really going on, I'm never really sure..."

"I'm not the only one good at hiding their feelings Daniel, you've got yours so completely buried, I wouldn't be surprised if you had to organize one of your little archaeological digs to uncover the depths to which your feelings are hidden."

Daniel knew that he deserved Vala's harsh words, and made no move to refute them. Instead, he watched as she curiously changed positions, dangling her head and torso over the bed while holding the sheet to her chest. When she came back up, she was clutching one of his discarded tee shirts. She sniffed it experimentally, and apparently deeming it clean enough to wear, pulled it over her head, dragging her hair out the back in a huff.

"Vala, wait, don't go." Daniel quickly found his boxer briefs and pulled them on as she propelled herself up from the bed, but Vala surprised him by beginning to pace in front of his bed instead of heading for the door. Her arms were crossed over her chest, and she muttered something suspiciously alien, but otherwise unintelligible under her breath before she started to speak. "This isn't all my fault you know."

Apparently Vala hadn't gotten the message Daniel had been trying to send earlier. "No, I'm not saying that. I've made mistakes too, I know that Vala…Look, it was easier to believe it was just a game to you, so I let myself. Because if I thought that you might actually have feelings for me, I'd have to acknowledge that I might have feelings for you."

Vala's pacing became faster, Daniel could see her fingers digging into her arms, leaving indentations on the black cloth of his shirt. "And that would be so awful, wouldn't it? Dr. Daniel Jackson, the upstanding formerly ascended, actually having feelings for the lying, thieving, alien harlot…" The fierceness in Vala's eyes was muted only by the tears threatening to spill any minute. Daniel's insides twisted at the thought of making her cry again.

"That is not true…"

"Then what is?" Vala fired back, "If what you said last night wasn't true, and you don't find me morally repulsive, then what is it Daniel?"

"I was afraid Vala. I've been hurt before, so badly I thought I'd never get through it. That much of what I said last night was true." Daniel had to stop and take a deep breath before he continued, willing his voice to return to a quieter volume. "Facing that again is, well, terrifying, especially knowing how much I care about you." Chancing a glance her way, Daniel saw that he was going to have to do a lot better than that to fix things between them.

That required another deep breath.

"I tend to…lose the people I care the most about. And I've already almost lost you so many times already. What if next time it's not _almost_? Or what happens when the Ori are defeated Vala? What if you decide that the SGC is too confining? What if I'm not enough to keep you here?" Normally Daniel would never reveal that much to anyone, even if he realized it was how he actually felt, but desperate times called for desperate measures, and hadn't he told Vala that they had to trust each other enough to be honest?

"That's a lot of what ifs, Daniel." She didn't rejoin him on the bed, but the look on her face had softened considerably, and she had stopped pacing furiously across his room. "If anything, I thought you would have learned by now how hard it is to get rid of me. I keep turning back up, just like a bad dollar."

Daniel smiled. "It's penny…turning up like a bad penny. And I've never been so lucky." This time when Daniel looked up at her, he was happy to see a small smile falling across her lips. "Look Vala, it was never about me thinking it was an awful thing to have feelings for you. By the time I even realized what was going on, you had more than proved yourself to me, to all of us…I just didn't want to lose you…I don't want to lose you. I guess I figured that if I kept you at arms length, we'd both be safer."

Vala stared at him for a few moments, making Daniel slightly uncomfortable, as if she was trying to figure out whether or not he was being completely truthful. Apparently satisfied that he was, she relaxed, ever so slightly. "Darling I'm delighted that you've finally said all this, but…" she paused for a minute, as if struggling with what she wanted to say, "I mean to say, you've blown off my advances, without being quite so callous, a million times before Daniel, what was different about last night?"

There was still one thing left to say, quite possibly the most difficult thing that Daniel had ever had to admit too. And Daniel really didn't know how to say it without sounding like an absolute ass. He took another deep breath, and decided to plow ahead before he lost his nerve.

"Last night I saw I could hurt you as much as you could hurt me." Vala's eyebrows shot up in surprise, so Daniel continued before she had the chance to misinterpret what he was saying. "Look, I know it's awful, and I fully intend on spending as much time as you'll let me making it up to you. But every other time, you've at least pretended what I said didn't bother you, didn't even dent the surface…this time you didn't. I saw you crying, and I knew you cared for me as much as I care about you."

This time it was Vala who sighed, turning away from Daniel. He held his breath, waiting for her next move.

"I know that most of the time you think that I'm shallow, immature…"

That was not the reaction Daniel was expecting to his revelation. "Vala, that's just not…"

"No Daniel, you got to explain yourself already, it's my turn." She took a deep breath and turned to face Daniel. "I was seventeen when Qetesh took me as her host. Seventeen, Daniel. I had my whole life ahead of me. There was…" She broke off for a moment before continuing on, "a boy from my village, we talked about getting married someday, but I was so young…I'd barely had my first kiss, barely discovered relationships beyond silly little girl crushes, and then I was trapped by Qetesh. And you've read all about Qetesh in your dusty old books, haven't you Daniel? Pages and pages of every twisted detail. She used beauty and sex to gain power, and Qetesh had a lot of power. There wasn't anything I could do to stop her; I was a prisoner in my very own body." Vala started pacing again, her arms wrapped around herself in a self protective gesture. Daniel wanted to reach out to her, to pull her to him, but Vala needed to say this, and he needed to hear it. He'd often guessed at what Vala had gone through as host to a goa'uld, but he'd never had the nerve to ask her about the experience, and up until now, she'd never volunteered much information herself.

Vala turned back to pacing before she spoke again, emotion ringing out in her voice. "I know you think most of what I do is a silly waste of time, roller skating around the corridors, reading fashion magazines and watching those serialized daytime television shows, but have you ever stopped to wonder why, that maybe it was about more than just annoying you? Did you ever think that it's because I can move my own eyes to read what I wish, my legs are my own to use to skate circles around Mitchell with? That she took the time away from me when I might have been doing silly things like that? Well not things like that specifically, my village was a bit primitive in comparison, but that's not the point!" Vala shook her head as she momentarily strayed from her topic, but once her mind cleared, she hit Daniel with a statement so true, he wondered why he hadn't picked up on it in two years. "Maybe I'm not as grown up as you think I should be, but I spent several key years of that particular process trapped by a goa'uld."

Vala was right; Daniel often didn't give much thought to why Vala did much of what she did, only wondered why she had to annoy him with her antics. That had been one of his first mistakes with her, and possibly his worst.

Vala's voice was gathering steam with every sentence, and soon she was practically shouting at Daniel as she paced. "Do you know what it's like to be trapped in your own body, for years at a time? Not to be able to close your own eyes to the horrors in front of you, not to be able to move your mouth to say _no_, or to move your arms of your own free will? To know that your body was carrying out unspeakable acts on the whim of a goa'uld, and that you could do nothing to stop it?"

Daniel knew there was nothing he could say, but Vala wasn't looking for a response from him. "For so long, the only thing that got me through was imagining what life could be like without Qetesh." She shook her head as a renegade tear escaped down her cheek. Her voice finally softened, and Daniel could feel his heart begin to break as he watched her recall the time after Qetesh's extraction. "But I wasn't prepared for the reality of it. The Tok'ra may have removed her, but I was the one who had to suffer the punishment for her crimes. I thought I could return home, to the life I was just beginning before becoming a host, but all any of the villagers could see was the destruction that Qetesh had caused. Even those that had cared about me before I was taken as a host. So I escaped as soon as I could, and I didn't look back. And yes, I lied, I cheated, and I stole, but no one was ever going to treat me that way again."

Vala plowed on though her voice was becoming shakier over the course of her own outburst. Daniel could see the pain in her eyes as she turned to face him again. "You once accused me of using sex to keep my distance. You were right, I use it the same way you use your dusty old books and artifacts to keep people from getting too close to you. For so long it's all I've known, and it worked for me. Never let anyone get too close, didn't form any relationships that would hurt when they inevitably ended. And then I met you, Daniel."

She sighed and dropped down at the foot of the bed. The anger seemed to have gone out of her voice, so Daniel cautiously moved across the bed to sit next to her, careful to avoid sitting too close and spooking her. This was the closest he had ever come to complete disclosure from Vala, and he wasn't sure he'd ever get the chance again. "For the first time, there was someone that believed, even just a little, that I could be more than a thief. After all I'd put you through, you still cared, and somewhere along the line, I realized that I'd fallen for you." The last part was practically whispered as Vala turned her head away, but Daniel was ready, gently turning her face back towards him.

"But you couldn't let me know," Daniel murmured, stroking her cheek softly. He understood now a little of what had been going on in Vala's mind, and he felt like an idiot. Maybe if he'd been able to step back from her annoying habits, he'd have been able to see more clearly what exactly those habits were masking. Instead, he'd been so intent on not letting Vala hurt him, that he'd completely missed how much he had hurt her.

She closed her eyes tight for a moment, drawing in a deep breath before she opened them again and met Daniel's gaze. "We didn't have the best introduction I'll admit, and then the Kor Mak bracelets…and in the beginning, maybe it was about annoying you and amusing myself, but there was something more…I wanted to be near you, even if it meant pestering you." She shrugged, sniffling deeply to restrain the tears threatening to fall. "After I came back from the Ori galaxy and joined Stargate Command, I thought things would be different…I am a different person than who I was before the Ori beachead. And sometimes things have been different with us, but most of the time, you treat me as the same person you came across two years ago. I've never understood how you could so thoroughly convince your government to take a chance on me when half the time you don't seem to trust me yourself."

Daniel sighed as he let his hand drop from her face and run across his own in frustration. "I've been unfair to you, a lot of the time. I don't know what else to say, other than I'm sorry. I'd like the chance to prove that to you."

He felt her hand at his knee, and when he looked back over to her, there was a wry smile on her face. "I supposed I deserved some of what you said. I know I haven't always made life easy for you."

Daniel returned her smile. "I never figured you for someone to reject an apology," he teased gently, feeling that it was safe to pick up her hand and squeeze it in his own.

"That was an apology? You're going to have to do much better than that." Vala's tone mimicked his own, and Daniel laughed, relaxing for the first time since he had watched her fall asleep. He felt her body weight shift to rest against his side, her head dropping to his shoulder. "You said we had to be completely honest with each other, right?"

"I think that would be a good start for us." Daniel let go of her hand, opting to wrap his arm around her waist instead as their conversation turned serious again.

Vala let out a deep sigh. "I don't know how to do this Daniel. I don't know how good I'll be at any of this relationship stuff."

Daniel tried, and failed, to ignore the tiny leap in his chest as his mind processed what her words meant. "Well, then we'll figure it out together." He pressed a kiss to the side of her head for effect, before letting his head drop to rest on top of hers.

"Together, huh? That does sound kind of nice."

Daniel grinned as Vala's hand turned upward, lacing their fingers together. "Mmhmm, I think so too. And I think you'll be better at this than you think."

"And why is that, darling?"

"You could have run. I was a little worried that you were going to leave when you got up, but you stayed, you listened, you talked to me…"

"Notice how I said most of what I did without insulting you," she interrupted softly, causing Daniel to sigh, quite possibly for the millionth time that night.

"That you did. And I'm sorry that I didn't."

"Actually, I think I'm glad you did say what you did. No really," she protested when Daniel opened his mouth to refute her. "Daniel, if you hadn't said most of what you did, we wouldn't be here right now. And I think you had to say some of that aloud, even just to realize that you didn't really mean it anymore. It's okay, alright?" The way that she snuggled in closer to his side told Daniel that she meant what he said. "Though I do seem to recall you saying something about making it up to me…"

"And I remember you saying something about round three."

As Vala's head lifted from under his, Daniel grinned at the gleam of mischief in her eyes; the Vala that he had come to know, and Ascended Beings help him, fall for, had returned in all her glory. Daniel couldn't have been happier. "Why Dr. Jackson, have you already figured out a way to make it up to me?"

Her head was tilted towards his in a manner far too enticing to resist, and Daniel found himself drawn in, only inches separating them by the time he murmured, "Oh, I've got an idea or two about that…"

Instead of capturing her lips though, he rested his forehead against hers. "I am sorry," he whispered, drawing a hand up to cup her cheek.

"We're fine," Vala whispered back, the last words that Daniel's mind registered for quite awhile as Vala closed the distance between them.

Later, Daniel smiled contentedly; amused by the way that the shirt Vala had been wearing had landed haphazardly on the desk across the room in his earlier haste to undress her.

"That may have been our best yet," Vala remarked with the tiniest bit of pride in her voice, curling closer into Daniel's side with her head tucked underneath his chin. She huffed a little in protest as Daniel repositioned her so that he could drag the covers up from the spot where they had spent the last while tangled at the foot of the bed. With the covers settled over them and Daniel drawing her back to his chest, both arms wrapped around her torso, she relaxed and they both settled into a blissful daze.

"Definitely amazing," Daniel concurred, stroking her back lightly and marveling at the fact that he could enjoy it without the guilt that had plagued him earlier. Sure, Daniel knew that he and Vala had some more issues to face in the future, but after the progress they had made, he was certain they would be able to deal with whatever came their way. And he might even get some sleep before he attempted to think about how they were going to announce this new turn of events to the rest of the team.

Still, Daniel couldn't quite find the energy to care too much about that when he had Vala tracing indiscernible patterns up and down his chest. He felt streams of warm breath tickle his neck as her fingers slowed and eventually stilled. He was nearly asleep himself when Vala stirred, her head lifting enough to murmur something sleepily into his ear.

"You will always be enough to keep me here my Daniel…always. No more doubts, okay?"

Not trusting his voice to cooperate, Daniel simply turned his head to gently capture her lips, drawing her closer into his embrace. He could only hope that his kiss conveyed what his normally expansive linguistic skills could not. When he finally pulled back after several lingering kisses, the soft smile on Vala's face told him everything he needed to know.

As they settled back to falling asleep, Daniel realized, with a small smile, that he had been right; life _is _too short. But feeling Vala pressed against his side and realizing that neither of them had anywhere else they would rather be, Daniel saw that even though life wasn't going to give him all the time he wanted, it had thrown Vala into his path, and he wasn't going to spend another day wasting the time he had to spend with her.

FIN.

A/N: I'm relatively new to the Stargate realm (I devoured seasons 9 and 10 on DVD, and am now catching up on the previous seasons), and I hope that I've done the characters justice. Any comments orconstructive criticism are welcome!


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